This invention relates generally to nano-scale fabrication techniques, and more particularly relates to techniques for producing nanopores in nanometric solid state materials.
Nanometric solid state materials, that is, solid state materials that can exist in equilibrium with only nanometers in thickness, include a wide range of materials such as monolayer, few-monolayer, and single molecule materials, that are becoming increasingly important for a wide range of applications, including, e.g., electronic, biological, and chemical applications. Many such applications require high-precision nanoscale features and structures for operation. For example, well-defined nanopores, or nanoscale pores having a diameter less than about 100 nanometers, are particularly required for many applications due to the nano-scale of the application itself or the environment in which the nanopore is to operate.
For example, nanopore-articulated nanoscale devices are of great interest for enabling the localization, detection, and characterization of molecules such as single DNA molecules or protein molecules. Nanopore filters and nanoscale holely membranes are likewise important for many critical biological separation and characterization procedures, as well as filtration processes. Many other micro-fluidic and nano-fluidic processing and control applications similarly rely on nano-scale features in nanometric materials.
To produce a nanoscale structure such as a nanopore in a nanometrically-thin material, it is in general required to manipulate the material with the precision of single atoms. This is in contrast to most conventional microelectronic fabrication processes, which characteristically only require precision that approaches the micron-scale. But without feature resolution and fabrication precision at the atomic level, it has in general not been possible to manipulate nanometrically-thin materials in a manner that exploits the particular characteristics which emerge at the nano-scale.
High-precision nanoscale processing has historically required a one-at-a-time fabrication paradigm that is often costly and inefficient. Generally, the high-volume, batch fabrication techniques of conventional microelectronic production have been incompatible with nanoscale feature production and material manipulation. But without the ability to precisely, reproducibly, and inexpensively mass-produce nanoscale features such as nanopores, many nanoscale systems cannot be developed for commercial implementation of many important nanoscale applications.